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***CHINA China Threat Reps Bad – Pan
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***CHINAChina Threat Reps Bad – PanTheir depiction of China reduces Chinese society to something to be observed with clinical detachment – this only creates a self-fulfilling prophecy and justifies warfare Pan 4 (Chengxin, Department of Political Science and International Relations, Faculty of Arts, Australian National University, “The "China Threat" in American Self-Imagination: The Discursive Construction of Other as Power Politics,” June/July 2004, Alternatives: Global, Local, Political, Vol. 29, No. 3, pp. 305-331, JSTOR)//PC While U.S. China scholars argue fiercely over "what China pre- cisely is," their debates have been underpinned by some common ground, especially in terms of a positivist epistemology. Firstly, they believe that China is ultimately a knowable object, whose reality can be, and ought to be, empirically revealed by scientific means. For example, after expressing his dissatisfaction with often con- flicting Western perceptions of China, David M. Lampton, former president of the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations, sug- gests that "it is time to step back and look at where China is today, where it might be going, and what consequences that direction will hold for the rest of the world."2 Like many other China scholars, Lampton views his object of study as essentially "something we can stand back from and observe with clinical detachment."3 Secondly, associated with the first assumption, it is commonly believed that China scholars merely serve as "disinterested observers and that their studies of China are neutral, passive descriptions of reality. And thirdly, in pondering whether China poses a threat or offers an opportunity to the United States, they rarely raise the question of "what the United States is." That is, the meaning of the United States is believed to be certain and beyond doubt. I do not dismiss altogether the conventional ways of debating China. It is not the purpose of this article to venture my own "obser- vation" of "where China is today," nor to join the "containment" ver- sus "engagement" debate per se. Rather, I want to contribute to a novel dimension of the China debate by questioning the seemingly unproblematic assumptions shared by most China scholars in the mainstream IR community in the United States. To perform this task, I will focus attention on a particularly significant component of the China debate; namely, the "China threat" literature. More specifically, I want to argue that U.S. conceptions of China as a threatening other are always intrinsically linked to how U.S. policymakers/mainstream China specialists see themselves (as representatives of the indispensable, security-conscious nation, for example). As such, they are not value-free, objective descriptions of an independent, preexisting Chinese reality out there, but are bet- ter understood as a kind of normative, meaning-giving practice that often legitimates power politics in U.S.-China relations and helps transform the "China threat" into social reality. In other words, it is self-fulfilling in practice, and is always part of the "China threat" problem it purports merely to describe. In doing so, I seek to bring to the fore two interconnected themes of self/other con- structions and of theory as practice inherent in the "China threat" literature - themes that have been overridden and rendered largely invisible by those common positivist assumptions. These themes are of course nothing new nor peculiar to the "China threat" literature. They have been identified elsewhere by critics of some conventional fields of study such as ethnography, anthropology, oriental studies, political science, and international relations.4 Yet, so far, the China field in the West in general and the U.S. "China threat" literature in particular have shown remarkable resistance to systematic critical reflection on both their normative status as discursive practice and their enormous practical implica- tions for international politics.5 It is in this context that this article seeks to make a contribution. I begin with a brief survey of the "China threat" argument in contemporary U.S. international relations literature, followed by an investigation of how this particular argument about China is a discursive construction of other, which is predicated on the predominant way in which the United States imagines itself as the uni- versal, indispensable nation-state in constant need of absolute cer- tainty and security. Finally, this article will illustrate some of the dan- gerous practical consequences of the "China threat" discourse for contemporary U.S.-China relations, particularly with regard to the 1995-1996 Taiwan Strait missile crisis and the 2001 spy-plane incident Constructing China as a threat creates a self-fulfilling prophecy, arms race, and increases the risks of escalation and warfare Pan 4 (Chengxin, Department of Political Science and International Relations, Faculty of Arts, Australian National University, “The "China Threat" in American Self-Imagination: The Discursive Construction of Other as Power Politics,” June/July 2004, Alternatives: Global, Local, Political, Vol. 29, No. 3, pp. 305-331, JSTOR)//PC I have argued above that the "China threat" argument in main- stream U.S. IR literature is derived, primarily, from a discursive construction of otherness. This construction is predicated on a particular narcissistic understanding of the U.S. self and on a posi- tivist-based realism, concerned with absolute certainty and security, a concern central to the dominant U.S. self-imaginary. Within these frameworks, it seems imperative that China be treated as a threatening, absolute other since it is unable to fit neatly into the U.S.-led evolutionary scheme or guarantee absolute security for the United States, so that U.S. power preponderance in the post-Cold War world can still be legitimated. Not only does this reductionist representation come at the expense of understanding China as a dynamic, multifaceted coun- try but it leads inevitably to a policy of containment that, in turn, tends to enhance the influence of realpolitik thinking, nationalist extremism, and hard-line stance in today's China. Even a small dose of the containment strategy is likely to have a highly dramatic impact on U.S.-China relations, as the 1995-1996 missile crisis and the 2001 spy-plane incident have vividly attested. In this respect, Chalmers Johnson is right when he suggests that "a policy of con- tainment toward China implies the possibility of war, just as it did during the Cold War vis-à-vis the former Soviet Union. The balance of terror prevented war between the United States and the Soviet Union, but this may not work in the case of China."93 For instance, as the United States presses ahead with a missile- defence shield to "guarantee" its invulnerability from rather unlikely sources of missile attacks, it would be almost certain to intensify China's sense of vulnerability and compel it to expand its current small nuclear arsenal so as to maintain the efficiency of its limited deterrence. In consequence, it is not impossible that the two countries, and possibly the whole region, might be dragged into an escalating arms race that would eventually make war more likely. Neither the United States nor China is likely to be keen on fighting the other. But as has been demonstrated, the "China threat" argument, for all its alleged desire for peace and security, tends to make war preparedness the most "realistic" option for both sides. At this juncture, worthy of note is an interesting com- ment made by Charlie Neuhauser, a leading CIA China specialist, on the Vietnam War, a war fought by the United States to contain the then-Communist "other." Neuhauser says, "Nobody wants it. We don't want it, Ho Chi Minh doesn't want it; it's simply a question of annoying the other side."94 And, as we know, in an unwanted war some fifty-eight thousand young people from the United States and an estimated two million Vietnamese men, women, and children lost their lives. Therefore, to call for a halt to the vicious circle of theory as practice associated with the "China threat" literature, tinkering with the current positivist-dominated U.S. IR scholarship on China is no longer adequate. Rather, what is needed is to question this un-self-reflective scholarship itself, particularly its connections with the dominant way in which the United States and the West in gen- eral represent themselves and others via their positivist epistemol- ogy, so that alternative, more nuanced, and less dangerous ways of interpreting and debating China might become possible. Representations of China as an economic threat are only rooted in us-them dichotomies to justify US hegemonic domination Pan 4 (Chengxin, Department of Political Science and International Relations, Faculty of Arts, Australian National University, “The "China Threat" in American Self-Imagination: The Discursive Construction of Other as Power Politics,” June/July 2004, Alternatives: Global, Local, Political, Vol. 29, No. 3, pp. 305-331, JSTOR)//PC That China constitutes a growing "threat" to the United States is arguably one of the most important "discoveries" by U.S. IR schol- ars in the post-Cold War era. For many, this "threat" is obvious for a variety of reasons concerning economic, military, cultural, and political dimensions. First and foremost, much of today's alarm about the "rise of China" resolves around the phenomenal devel- opment of the Chinese economy during the past twenty-five years: Its overall size has more than quadrupled since 1978. China expert Nicholas Lardy of the Brookings Institution suggested that "the pace of China's industrial development and trade expansion is unparalleled in modern economic history." He went on: "While this has led to unprecedented improvements in Chinese incomes and living standards, it also poses challenges for other countries."6 One such challenge is thought to be job losses in the United States. A recent study done for a U.S. congressional panel found that at least 760,000 U.S. manufacturing jobs have migrated to China since 1992. 7 Associated with this economic boom is China's growing trade surplus with the United States, which, according to Time magazine journalists Richard Bernstein and Ross Munro, increased nearly tenfold from $3.5 billion in 1988 to roughly $33.8 billion in 1995. This trade imbalance, as they put it, is a function of a Chinese strategy to target certain industries and to undersell American competition via a system of subsidies and high tariffs. And that is why the deficit is harmful to the Ameri- can economy and likely to become an area of ever greater con- flict in bilateral relations in the future.8 For many, also frightening is a prospect of the emergence of so- called "Greater China" (a vast economic zone consisting of main- land China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan). As Harry Harding points out, "Although [Greater China] was originally intended in [a] benign economic sense, ... in some quarters it evokes much more aggressive analogies, such as the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere or Greater Germany."9 In this context, some believe that China's economic challenge inevitably gives rise to a simultaneous military threat. As Denny Roy argues: "A stronger, wealthier China would have greater where- withal to increase its arsenal of nuclear-armed ICBMs and to increase their lethality through improvements in range, accuracy, and survivability. If China continues its rate of economic expan- sion, absolute growth in Chinese nuclear capabilities should be expected to increase."10 Furthermore, U.S. Congressman Bob Schaf- fer claimed that China's military buildup, already under way at an alarming rate, was aimed at the United States.11 In addition to what they see as a worrying economic and mili- tary expansion, many U.S. China scholars believe that there exist still other dimensions to the "China threat" problem, such as China's "Middle Kingdom" mentality, unresolved historical griev- ances, and an undemocratic government.12 Warren I. Cohen argues that "probably the most ethnocentric people in the world, the Chinese considered their realm the center of the universe, the Middle Kingdom, and regarded all cultural differences as signs of inferiority."13 As a result, it is argued, the outside world has good reason to be concerned that "China will seek to reestablish in some form the political and cultural hegemony that it enjoyed in Asia during the Ming and early Qing dynasties."14 At another level, from a "democratic peace" standpoint, a China under the rule of an authoritarian regime is predisposed to behave irresponsibly. As Bernstein and Munro put it: If the history of the last two hundred years is any guide, the more democratic countries become, the less likely they are to fight wars against each other. The more dictatorial they are, the more war prone they become. Indeed, if the current Beijing regime con- tinues to engage in military adventurism - as it did in the Taiwan Strait in 1996- there will be a real chance of at least limited naval or air clashes with the United States.15 Subscribing to the same logic, Denny Roy asserts that "the estab- lishment of a liberal democracy in China is extremely unlikely in the foreseeable future. . . . Without democratization within, there is no basis for expecting more pacific behavior without."16 However, for other observers, even if China does become democ- ratized, the threat may still remain. Postulating what he calls the "democratic paradox" phenomenon, Samuel Huntington suggests that democratization is as likely to encourage international conflict as it is to promote peace.17 Indeed, many China watchers believe that an increase in market freedom has already led to an upsurge in Chinese nationalism, the only thing that allegedly provides the glue to hold contemporary China together.18 It is argued that such nationalist sentiment, coupled with memories of its past humilia- tion and thwarted grandeur, will make China an increasingly dis- satisfied, revisionist power - hence, a threat to the international status quo. Furthermore, some point out that what is also troublesome is an entrenched realpolitik strategic culture in traditional Chinese thought. Harvard China expert Alastair Iain Johnston, for exam- ple, argues that Chinese strategic culture is dominated by the para- bellum (prepare for war) paradigm. This paradigm believes that warfare is a relatively constant feature in international relations, that stakes in conflicts with the adversary are zero-sum in nature, and that the use of force is the most efficacious means of dealing with threat.19 From this, Warren Cohen concludes that if Johnston's analysis of China's strategic culture is correct - and I believe that it is - generational change will not guarantee a kinder, gentler China. Nor will the ultimate disappearance of communism in Beijing. The powerful China we have every reason to expect in the twenty-first century is likely to be as aggressive and expansionist as China has been whenever it has been the dominant power in Asia.20 Apart from these so-called "domestic" reasons for the "China threat," some commentators arrive at a similar conclusion based on the historical experience of power realignment as a result of the rise and fall of great powers. China, from this perspective, is regarded as the most likely candidate to fill the power vacuum cre- ated by the end of U.S.-Soviet rivalry in East Asia. This, according to Kenneth Lieberthal at the University of Michigan (and formerly of the U.S. State Department), "will inevitably present major chal- lenges to the United States and the rest of the international system since the perennial question has been how the international com- munity can accommodate the ambitions of newly powerful states, which have always forced realignment of the international system and have more often than not led to war."21 For this reason, the rise of China has often been likened to that of Nazi Germany and militarist Japan on the eve of the two world wars. For example, Richard K. Betts and Thomas J. Christen- sen argue: Like Germany a century ago, China is a late-blooming great power emerging into a world already ordered strategically by ear- lier arrivals; a continental power surrounded by other powers who are collectively stronger but individually weaker (with the exception of the United States and, perhaps, Japan); a bustling country with great expectations, dissatisfied with its place in the international pecking order, if only with regard to international prestige and respect. The quest for a rightful "place in the sun" will, it is argued, inevitably foster growing friction with Japan, Russia, India or the United States.22 At this point, it seems there has been enough reason and em- pirical evidence for the United States to be vigilant about China's future ambition. While there are debates over the extent to which the threat is imminent or to which approaches might best explain it, the "objective" quality of such a threat has been taken for granted. In the words of Walter McDougall, the Pulitzer Prize- winning historian and strategic thinker at the University of Penn- sylvania, recognizing the "China threat" is "commonsense geopoli- tics."23 For Huntington, the challenge of "Greater China" to the West is simply a rapidly growing cultural, economic, and political "reality."24 Similarly, when they claim that "China can pose a grave problem," Betts and Christensen are convinced that they are merely referring to "the truth."25 In the following sections, I want to question this "truth," and, more generally, question the objective, self-evidentiary attitudes that underpin it. In my view, the "China threat" literature is best understood as a particular kind of discursive practice that dichotomizes the West and China as self and other. In this sense, the "truism" that China presents a growing threat is not so much an objective reflection of contemporary global reality, per se, as it is a discursive construction of otherness that acts to bolster the hegemonic leadership of the United States in the post-Cold War world. Therefore, to have a better understanding of how the dis- cursive construction of China as a "threat" takes place, it is now necessary to turn attention to a particularly dominant way of U.S. self-imagination. Warnings of China rise are rooted in false us-them dichotomies used to justify US hegemonic power Pan 4 (Chengxin, Department of Political Science and International Relations, Faculty of Arts, Australian National University, “The "China Threat" in American Self-Imagination: The Discursive Construction of Other as Power Politics,” June/July 2004, Alternatives: Global, Local, Political, Vol. 29, No. 3, pp. 305-331, JSTOR)//PC In addition to what they see as a worrying economic and mili- tary expansion, many U.S. China scholars believe that there exist still other dimensions to the "China threat" problem, such as China's "Middle Kingdom" mentality, unresolved historical griev- ances, and an undemocratic government.12 Warren I. Cohen argues that "probably the most ethnocentric people in the world, the Chinese considered their realm the center of the universe, the Middle Kingdom, and regarded all cultural differences as signs of inferiority."13 As a result, it is argued, the outside world has good reason to be concerned that "China will seek to reestablish in some form the political and cultural hegemony that it enjoyed in Asia during the Ming and early Qing dynasties."14 At another level, from a "democratic peace" standpoint, a China under the rule of an authoritarian regime is predisposed to behave irresponsibly. As Bernstein and Munro put it: If the history of the last two hundred years is any guide, the more democratic countries become, the less likely they are to fight wars against each other. The more dictatorial they are, the more war prone they become. Indeed, if the current Beijing regime con- tinues to engage in military adventurism - as it did in the Taiwan Strait in 1996- there will be a real chance of at least limited naval or air clashes with the United States.15 Subscribing to the same logic, Denny Roy asserts that "the estab- lishment of a liberal democracy in China is extremely unlikely in the foreseeable future. . . . Without democratization within, there is no basis for expecting more pacific behavior without."16 However, for other observers, even if China does become democ- ratized, the threat may still remain. Postulating what he calls the "democratic paradox" phenomenon, Samuel Huntington suggests that democratization is as likely to encourage international conflict as it is to promote peace.17 Indeed, many China watchers believe that an increase in market freedom has already led to an upsurge in Chinese nationalism, the only thing that allegedly provides the glue to hold contemporary China together.18 It is argued that such nationalist sentiment, coupled with memories of its past humilia- tion and thwarted grandeur, will make China an increasingly dis- satisfied, revisionist power - hence, a threat to the international status quo. Furthermore, some point out that what is also troublesome is an entrenched realpolitik strategic culture in traditional Chinese thought. Harvard China expert Alastair Iain Johnston, for exam- ple, argues that Chinese strategic culture is dominated by the para- bellum (prepare for war) paradigm. This paradigm believes that warfare is a relatively constant feature in international relations, that stakes in conflicts with the adversary are zero-sum in nature, and that the use of force is the most efficacious means of dealing with threat.19 From this, Warren Cohen concludes that if Johnston's analysis of China's strategic culture is correct - and I believe that it is - generational change will not guarantee a kinder, gentler China. Nor will the ultimate disappearance of communism in Beijing. The powerful China we have every reason to expect in the twenty-first century is likely to be as aggressive and expansionist as China has been whenever it has been the dominant power in Asia.20 Apart from these so-called "domestic" reasons for the "China threat," some commentators arrive at a similar conclusion based on the historical experience of power realignment as a result of the rise and fall of great powers. China, from this perspective, is regarded as the most likely candidate to fill the power vacuum cre- ated by the end of U.S.-Soviet rivalry in East Asia. This, according to Kenneth Lieberthal at the University of Michigan (and formerly of the U.S. State Department), "will inevitably present major chal- lenges to the United States and the rest of the international system since the perennial question has been how the international com- munity can accommodate the ambitions of newly powerful states, which have always forced realignment of the international system and have more often than not led to war."21 For this reason, the rise of China has often been likened to that of Nazi Germany and militarist Japan on the eve of the two world wars. For example, Richard K. Betts and Thomas J. Christen- sen argue: Like Germany a century ago, China is a late-blooming great power emerging into a world already ordered strategically by ear- lier arrivals; a continental power surrounded by other powers who are collectively stronger but individually weaker (with the exception of the United States and, perhaps, Japan); a bustling country with great expectations, dissatisfied with its place in the international pecking order, if only with regard to international prestige and respect. The quest for a rightful "place in the sun" will, it is argued, inevitably foster growing friction with Japan, Russia, India or the United States.22 At this point, it seems there has been enough reason and em- pirical evidence for the United States to be vigilant about China's future ambition. While there are debates over the extent to which the threat is imminent or to which approaches might best explain it, the "objective" quality of such a threat has been taken for granted. In the words of Walter McDougall, the Pulitzer Prize- winning historian and strategic thinker at the University of Penn- sylvania, recognizing the "China threat" is "commonsense geopoli- tics."23 For Huntington, the challenge of "Greater China" to the West is simply a rapidly growing cultural, economic, and political "reality."24 Similarly, when they claim that "China can pose a grave problem," Betts and Christensen are convinced that they are merely referring to "the truth."25 In the following sections, I want to question this "truth," and, more generally, question the objective, self-evidentiary attitudes that underpin it. In my view, the "China threat" literature is best understood as a particular kind of discursive practice that dichotomizes the West and China as self and other. In this sense, the "truism" that China presents a growing threat is not so much an objective reflection of contemporary global reality, per se, as it is a discursive construction of otherness that acts to bolster the hegemonic leadership of the United States in the post-Cold War world. Therefore, to have a better understanding of how the dis- cursive construction of China as a "threat" takes place, it is now necessary to turn attention to a particularly dominant way of U.S. self-imagination. Representations of China as a threat are not grounded in reality and are merely a construction of a foil to the American system to legitimize US power Pan 4 (Chengxin, Department of Political Science and International Relations, Faculty of Arts, Australian National University, “The "China Threat" in American Self-Imagination: The Discursive Construction of Other as Power Politics,” June/July 2004, Alternatives: Global, Local, Political, Vol. 29, No. 3, pp. 305-331, JSTOR)//PC At first glance, as the "China threat" literature has told us, China seems to fall perfectly into the "threat" category, particularly given its growing power. However, China's power as such does not speak for itself in terms of an emerging threat. By any reasonable measure, China remains a largely poor country edged with only a sliver of affluence along its coastal areas. Nor is China's sheer size a self-evident confirmation of the "China threat" thesis, as other countries like India, Brazil, and Australia are almost as big as China. Instead, China as a "threat" has much to do with the partic- ular mode of U.S. self-imagination. As Steve Chan notes: China is an object of attention not only because of its huge size, ancient legacy, or current or projected relative national power. . . . The importance of China has to do with perceptions, espe- cially those regarding the potential that Beijing will become an example, source, or model that contradicts Western liberalism as the reigning paradigm. In an era of supposed universalizing cos- mopolitanism, China demonstrates the potency and persistence of nationalism, and embodies an alternative to Western and espe- cially U.S. conceptions of democracy and capitalism. China is a reminder that history is not close to an end.39 Certainly, I do not deny China's potential for strategic misbe- havior in the global context, nor do I claim the "essential peace- fulness" of Chinese culture.40 Having said that, my main point here is that there is no such thing as "Chinese reality" that can auto- matically speak for itself, for example, as a "threat." Rather, the "China threat" is essentially a specifically social meaning given to China by its U.S. observers, a meaning that cannot be discon- nected from the dominant U.S. self-construction. Thus, to fully understand the U.S. "China threat" argument, it is essential to rec- ognize its autobiographical nature. Indeed, the construction of other is not only a product of U.S. self-imagination, but often a necessary foil to it. For example, by taking this particular representation of China as Chinese reality per se, those scholars are able to assert their self-identity as "mature," "rational" realists capable of knowing the "hard facts" of inter- national politics, in distinction from those "idealists" whose views are said to be grounded more in "an article of faith" than in "his- torical experience."41 On the other hand, given that history is apparently not "progressively" linear, the invocation of a certain other not only helps explain away such historical uncertainties or "anomalies" and maintain the credibility of the allegedly universal path trodden by the United States, but also serves to highlight U.S. "indispensability." As Samuel Huntington puts it, "If being an American means being committed to the principles of liberty, democracy, individualism, and private property, and if there is no evil empire out there threatening those principles, what indeed does it mean to be an American, and what becomes of American national interests?"42 In this way, it seems that the constructions of the particular U.S. self and its other are always intertwined and mutually reinforcing. Some may suggest that there is nothing particularly wrong with this since psychologists generally agree that "individuals and groups define their identity by differentiating themselves from and placing themselves in opposition to others."43 This is perhaps true. As the Swiss linguist Ferdinand de Saussure tells us, meaning itself depends on difference and differentiation.44 Yet, to understand the U.S. dichotomized constructions of self/other in this light is to normalize them and render them unproblematic, because it is also apparent that not all identity-defining practices necessarily per- ceive others in terms of either universal sameness or absolute oth- erness and that difference need not equate to threat. Representations of China as a threat creates an Orientalist us-them dichotomy and a self-fulfilling prophecy Pan 4 (Chengxin, Department of Political Science and International Relations, Faculty of Arts, Australian National University, “The "China Threat" in American Self-Imagination: The Discursive Construction of Other as Power Politics,” June/July 2004, Alternatives: Global, Local, Political, Vol. 29, No. 3, pp. 305-331, JSTOR)//PC In the same way, a multitude of other unpredictable factors (such as ethnic rivalry, local insurgencies, overpopulation, drug trafficking, environmental degradation, rogue states, the spread of weapons of mass destruction, and international terrorism) have also been labeled as "threats" to U.S. security. Yet, it seems that in the post-Cold War environment, China represents a kind of uncer- tainty par excellence. "Whatever the prospects for a more peaceful, more democratic, and more just world order, nothing seems more uncertain today than the future of post-Deng China,"55 argues Samuel Kim. And such an archetypical uncertainty is crucial to the enterprise of U.S. self-construction, because it seems that only an uncertainty with potentially global consequences such as China could justify U.S. indispensability or its continued world domi- nance. In this sense, Bruce Cumings aptly suggested in 1996 that China (as a threat) was basically "a metaphor for an enormously expensive Pentagon that has lost its bearings and that requires a formidable 'renegade state' to define its mission (Islam is rather vague, and Iran lacks necessary weights)."56 It is mainly on the basis of this self-fashioning that many U.S. scholars have for long claimed their "expertise" on China. For example, from his observation (presumably on Western TV net- works) of the Chinese protest against the U.S. bombing of their embassy in Belgrade in May 1999, Robert Kagan is confident enough to speak on behalf of the whole Chinese people, claiming that he knows "the fact" of "what [China] really thinks about the United States." That is, "they consider the United States an enemy - or, more precisely, the enemy. . . . How else can one interpret the Chinese government's response to the bombing?" he asks, rhetori- cally.57 For Kagan, because the Chinese "have no other informa- tion" than their government's propaganda, the protesters cannot rationally "know" the whole event as "we" do. Thus, their anger must have been orchestrated, unreal, and hence need not be taken seriously.58 Given that Kagan heads the U.S. Leadership Project at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and is very much at the heart of redefining the United States as the benevolent global hegemon, his confidence in speaking for the Chinese "other" is perhaps not surprising. In a similar vein, without producing in-depth analysis, Bern- stein and Munro invoke with great ease such all-encompassing notions as "the Chinese tradition" and its "entire three-thousand- year history."59 In particular, they repeatedly speak of what China's "real" goal is: "China is an unsatisfied and ambitious power whose goal is to dominate Asia. . . . China aims at achieving a kind of hegemony. . . . China is so big and so naturally powerful that [we know] it will tend to dominate its region even if it does not intend to do so as a matter of national policy "m Likewise, with the goal of ab- solute security for the United States in mind, Richard Betts and Thomas Christensen argue: The truth is that China can pose a grave problem even if it does not become a military power on the American model, does not intend to commit aggression, integrates into a global economy, and liberalizes politically. Similarly, the United States could face a dangerous conflict over Taiwan even if it turns out that Beijing lacks the capacity to conquer the island. . . . This is true because of geography; because of America's reliance on alliances to pro- ject power; and because of China's capacity to harm U.S. forces, U.S. regional allies, and the American homeland, even while los- ing a war in the technical, military sense.61 By now, it seems clear that neither China's capabilities nor intentions really matter. Rather, almost by its mere geographical existence, China has been qualified as an absolute strategic "other," a discursive construct from which it cannot escape. Because of this, "China" in U.S. IR discourse has been objectified and deprived of its own subjectivity and exists mainly in and for the U.S. self. Little wonder that for many U.S. China specialists, China becomes merely a "national security concern" for the United States, with the "severe disproportion between the keen attention to China as a security concern and the intractable neglect of China's [own] security con- cerns in the current debate."62 At this point, at issue here is no longer whether the "China threat" argument is true or false, but is rather its reflection of a shared positivist mentality among mainstream China experts that they know China better than do the Chinese themselves.63 "We" alone can know for sure that they consider "us" their enemy and thus pose a menace to "us." Such an account of China, in many ways, strongly seems to resemble Orientalists' problematic distinc- tion between the West and the Orient. Like orientalism, the U.S. construction of the Chinese "other" does not require that China acknowledge the validity of that dichotomous construction. Indeed, as Edward Said point out, "It is enough for 'us' to set up these distinctions in our own minds; [and] 'they' become 'they' accordingly."64 It may be the case that there is nothing inherently wrong with perceiving others through one's own subjective lens. Yet, what is problematic with mainstream U.S. China watchers is that they refuse to acknowledge the legitimacy of the inherent fluidity of Chinese identity and subjectivity and try instead to fix its ambiguity as absolute difference from "us," a kind of certainty that denotes nothing but otherness and threats. As a result, it becomes difficult to find a legitimate space for alternative ways of understanding an inherently volatile, amorphous China65 or to recognize that China's future trajectory in global politics is contingent essentially on how "we" in the United States and the West in general want to see it as well as on how the Chinese choose to shape it.66 Indeed, discourses of "us" and "them" are always closely linked to how "we" as "what we are" deal with "them" as "what they are" in the practical realm. This is exactly how the discursive strategy of perceiving China as a threatening other should be understood, a point addressed in the following section, which explores some of the practical dimension of this discursive strategy in the containment perspectives and hegemonic ambitions of U.S. foreign policy. Depictions of China as a threat and crisis-mangement strategies shape policy-making strategies Pan 4 (Chengxin, Department of Political Science and International Relations, Faculty of Arts, Australian National University, “The "China Threat" in American Self-Imagination: The Discursive Construction of Other as Power Politics,” June/July 2004, Alternatives: Global, Local, Political, Vol. 29, No. 3, pp. 305-331, JSTOR)//PC This "neocontainment" policy has been echoed in the "China threat" literature. In a short yet decisive article titled "Why We Must Contain China," Washington Post columnist Charles Krautham- mer insists that "containing China" and "undermining its ruthless dictatorship" constitute two essential components of "any rational policy toward a rising, threatening China." Not only is a policy other than containment considered irrational, but even a delay to implement it would be undesirable, as he urges that "containment of such a bully must begin early in its career." To this end, Kraut- hammer offers such "practical" options as strengthening regional alliances (with Vietnam, India, and Russia, as well as Japan) to box in China; standing by Chinese dissidents; denying Beijing the right to host the Olympics; and keeping China from joining the World Trade Organization on the terms it desires.68 Containing China is of course not the only option arising from the "China threat" literature. More often than not, there is a sub- tle, business-style "crisis management" policy. For example, Bern- stein and Munro shy away from the word containment, preferring to call their China policy management.69 Yet, what remains unchanged in the management formula is a continued promotion of control- ling China. For instance, a perusal of Bernstein and Munro's texts reveals that what they mean by management is no different than Krauthammer's explicit containment stance.70 By framing U.S.- China relations as an issue of "crisis management," they leave little doubt of who is the "manager" and who is to be "managed." In a more straightforward manner, Betts and Christensen state that coercion and war must be part and parcel of the China manage- ment policy: In addressing the China challenge, the United States needs to think hard about three related questions: first, how to avoid crises and war through prudent, coercive diplomacy; second, how to manage crises and fight a war if the avoidance effort fails; third, how to end crises and terminate war at costs acceptable to the United States and its allies.71 This is not to imply that the kind of perspectives outlined above will automatically be translated into actual China policy, but one does not have to be exceedingly perceptive to note that the "China threat" perspective does exert enormous influence on U.S. policy making on China. To illustrate this point, I want now to examine some specific implications of U.S. representations of the "China threat" for U.S.-China relations in relation to the 1995-1996 Taiwan Strait missile crisis and the "spy plane" incident of 2001. The affirmatives representations of China as a threat only create a self-fulfilling prophecy – 2001 spy plane incident proves Pan 4 (Chengxin, Department of Political Science and International Relations, Faculty of Arts, Australian National University, “The "China Threat" in American Self-Imagination: The Discursive Construction of Other as Power Politics,” June/July 2004, Alternatives: Global, Local, Political, Vol. 29, No. 3, pp. 305-331, JSTOR)//PC Theory as Practice 2: The 2001 Spy-Plane Incident Following the 1995-1996 missile crisis, mainstream China observers have continued to take the Taiwan question as a purely geopolitical or security issue, which accordingly should be understood and dealt with simply from the time-honored balance-of-power, zero-sum game perspectives. For example, Bernstein and Munro insist that Taiwan's reunification with the mainland Vili leave China in possession of yet another immense economic prize. . . . Complete Chinese reunifica- tion, in other words, would further upset the balance of power and vastly enhance China's economic and strategic strength."79 Com- menting on this typical way of representing the Taiwan question, the Taiwan-based scholar Chih-yu Shih suggests that the national security analysis may seem to be a more tangible approach to dissecting the rationale behind Beijing's "policy of coercion" and, because it appears sensible to us, can alleviate our need to pursue Beijing's motivations more deeply. Not only can we thus camouflage our embarrassment at not really knowing China, but also Beijing's discomforting behavioural patterns be- come comfortably familiar.80 Clearly, the practical implications of this kind of representation go far beyond that. After perceiving a power imbalance in the Tai- wan Strait in favor of China, James Lilley (former U.S. ambassador to China) and Carl Ford proposed: "The name of the game for Tai- wan, then, is deterrence," which means that the United States must help Taiwan's military maintain "a qualitative edge over the PRC."81 The 2002 Report to Congress of the U.S.-China Security Review Commission reached similar conclusions, recommending, among other things, "deterring China attacking Taiwan" and "supporting Taiwan's ability to defend itself without outside assistance." In its formal conclusion, the review commission, made up of well-known U.S. China experts as well as influential policymakers, vows to con- tinue monitoring China in every aspect relating to "our national security concerns."82 In fact, U.S. monitoring activity, such as conducting reconnais- sance flights along Chinese borders, had always been part of its China policy. So went the rationale: The Chinese say they have the right to use force to reclaim Tai- wan because it belongs to them, and they regularly practice for an invasion. This threat of force is why on April 1st [2001], the U.S. Navy's EP-3 surveillance plane was in the area to monitor China 's military preparations. ss Yet it turned out that the EP-3 spy plane collided with a Chinese navy fighter jet that was tailing it over the South China Sea, some fifty miles from the coast of China's Hainan Province. The Chinese jet crashed into the waters below, while the crippled spy plane landed on Hainan island. Washington demanded immediate return of its crew and plane, while Beijing insisted that the United States bear the responsibility for the midair collision and apologize for the incident. Rather than reflecting on how their new containment policy might have contributed to this incident in the first place, many U.S. realist analysts hastily interpreted it as further objective proof of the long-suspected "China threat." As Allen S. Whiting put it, the collision "focused attention anew on Beijing's willingness to risk the use of force in pursuit of political objectives."84 It was as if the whole incident had little to do with U.S. spying, which was seen as "routine" and "normal." Instead, it was the Chinese who were said to be "playing a dangerous game," without regard to the old spy etiquette formulated during the Cold War.85 For other observers, China's otherness was embodied also in its demand for a U.S. apology. For example, Merle Goldman, a history professor at Boston University, said that the Chinese emphasis on apologies was rooted in the Confucian value system: "This kind of internalized consensus was the way China was ruled for thousands of years."86 From this perspective, China's request for an apology was preordained by a fixed Chinese tradition and national psyche and had nothing whatsoever to do with the specific context of this incident in which China was spied on, its sovereignty violated, and one of its pilots lost. Thus, even in the face of such a potentially explosive incident, the self-fulfilling effect of the "China threat" discourse has not been acknowledged by mainstream U.S. China analysts. To the con- trary, deterring and containing China has gained new urgency. For example, in the aftermath of this standoff, neoconservative colum- nists Robert Kagan and William Kristol (chairman of the Project for the New American Century) wrote that "not only is the sale of Aegis [to Taiwan] . . . the only appropriate response to Chinese behav- ior; We have been calling for the active containment of China for the past six years precisely because we think it is the only way to keep the peace."87 Although the sale of the Aegis destroyers was deferred, President George W. Bush approved an arms package for Taiwan that included so-called "defensive" weapons such as four Kidd class destroyers, eight diesel submarines, and twelve P-3C sub- marine-hunting aircraft, as well as minesweeping helicopters, tor- pedoes, and amphibious assault vehicles. On this arms sale, David Shambaugh, a Washington-based China specialist, had this to say: "Given the tangible threats that the Chinese military can present to Taiwan - particularly a naval blockade or quarantine and missile threats - this is a sensible and timely package."88 Given the danger and high stakes involved, some may wonder why China did not simply cooperate so that there would be no need for U.S. "containment." To some extent, China has been cooperative. For example, Beijing was at pains to calm a disgrun- tled Chinese public by explaining that the U.S. "sorry" letter issued at the end of the spy-plane incident was a genuine "apology," with U.S. officials openly rejecting that interpretation. On the Taiwan question, China has dropped many of its previous demands (such as "one China" being defined as the People's Republic). As to the South China Sea, China has allowed the ASEAN Regional Forum to seek a negotiated solution to the Spratly Islands dispute and also agreed to join the Philippines as cochairs of the working group on confidence-building measures.89 In January 2002, China chose to play down an incident that a presidential jet outfitted in the United States had been crammed with sophisticated satellite-operated bugs, a decision that, as the New York Times puts it, "illustrates the depth of China's current com- mitment to cultivating better relations with the United States."90 Also, over the years, China has ratified a number of key nonprolif- eration treaties and pledged not to assist countries in developing missiles with ranges that exceed the limits established under the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR). More recently, China has collaborated with the United States in the war on terrorism, including issuing new regulations to restrict the export of missile technology to countries usually accused by the United States of aid- ing terrorists. Indeed, as some have argued, by any reasonable mea- sure China is now more responsible in international affairs than at any time since 1949.91 And yet, the real problem is that, so long as the United States continues to stake its self-identity on the realization of absolute security, no amount of Chinese cooperation would be enough. For instance, Iain Johnston views the constructive development of China's arms-control policy as a kind of "realpolitik adaptation," rather than "genuine learning."92 From this perspective, however China has changed, it would remain a fundamentally threatening other, which the United States cannot live with but has to take full control of. 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